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LBB 1042
ACADEMIC WRITING

Assignment 3

Submitted to : Ms Gurdip Saini
Submitted by : Ng Zhia Hwa
Matric No. : 15428

Title : A theft of works among the students : Plagiarism.

During the antiquity, it exists an ancient concept called plagiarism. Plagiarism is happened when a student fail to properly document and give attribution to the source of ideas and text in his work. Alongside with the commercialization of writing, the concept of copyright and the rights given to authors has developed (VAIL Faculty Administrator, 1996-2003). However, the problem of plagiarism has been increased nowadays and became a highly debatable issue. For instance, Ellery (2008) contends that of the students registered for the module, 39 students, which are 26%, submitted plagiarized essays in their essay assignment. Nevertheless, there are several factors and ways that can cause students to plagiarize.

As it is known, students develop particular relationships to text and learning every day. In this case, Pennycook (1996) clarifies the difference between plagiarizing ideas and plagiarizing language. When the student takes the ideas which are clearly not his own but rephrase the language, the student is plagiarizing the ideas but not words. On the other hand, the student who is understand the material and author, will consider that rewrite in own his words may result in less effective, more mistakes, less powerful message and will not achieve such clarity.

The incidence of plagiarism among the students is through the use of electronic sources. There were several reasons of plagiarism which are related to ignorance or misunderstanding of good referencing practices, poor engagement with the issues at hand and dishonest intention (Ellery). In addition, students are not aware of the requirement to acknowledge such sources in an in-text format because there is lack of information on many electronic documents. Ellery also further states that failure to internalize the need to reference and act accordingly may be due to the fact that underlying reasons for referencing are not explored enough with the students.

Furthermore, plagiarism is caused by the study habits of the students. Pennycook conducted informal interviews with Hong Kong Chinese students at the University of Hong Kong who had been caught plagiarizing. It seemed that apart from the students had just copied a passage and hoped to get away with it, some were aware that the essay had not been very good and complained of heavy workloads. Other students showed less awareness that they had done wrong but highlighted parts of texts were reused in the essay. Besides, Pennycook claims that there is dissatisfaction with the first year at university which lack of incentive to work hard and quality of the lecturers and tutorials.

In conclusion, plagiarism may be conducted by several ways and reasons. VAIL Faculty Administrator reveals that when a student fail to engage his mind with the subject that are writing about or being tested on, and simply submit another’s work, the student will stymie his intellectual growth. Hence, plagiarism should be avoided and a proper attribution should be carried out during the tasks so that the copyright of the authors can be protected.
References

Ellery, K. (2008). An investigation into electronic-source plagiarism in a first- year essay assignment (abridged). Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education, 33(6), pp. 607-617.

Pennycook, A. (1996). Borrowing Others’ Words: Text, Ownership, Memory, and Plagiarism (abridged). TESCOL Quarterly, 30(2), pp. 201-230.

Virtual Academic Integrity Laboratory (VAIL) Faculty Administrator (1996-2003). Academic Integrity and Plagiarism in the Classroom: An Overview. Center for Intellectual Property at University of Maryland University College. Retrieved September 30, 2010 from http://www.umuc.edu/distance/odell/cip